Among cities its size Hartford's child poverty rate is the second highest in the country. In greater Hartford, 100,000 people receive food from food pantries, soup kitchens and shelters, and 40,000 of them are children.

The grant to GE is funded by an electric bill surcharge, levied on every household in the state....

That, gentle reader, is how business is done!Here's the headline story from cnet:

General Electric plans to give its solar business a charge within two years by introducing panels with the same solar cell material used by industry cost leader First Solar.

In 2011, the energy giant expects to produce solar panels made with cadmium telluride, a thin-film solar cell material, Michael Idelchik, vice president of advanced technologies at GE Global Research, said here Wednesday at the EmTech conference. The company now sells solar panels that use silicon solar cells, but its long-term bet is on thin-film--and specifically cadmium telluride--because it offers the cheapest cost per watt, he said.

Last year, GE's energy division took a majority stake in Golden, Colo.-based PrimeStar Solar, for its cadmium telluride cell technology. GE is now developing a product around that aimed at utility and commercial customers.

Solar at GE is a relatively small part of its sprawling energy portfolio, which covers everything from nuclear power plants to natural gas turbines. But GE expects that solar has the potential to grow rapidly, as its multibillion-dollar wind business has done over the past five years.

"Solar is definitely the next wind for us. It's not there yet, but it's moving very rapidly," Idelchik said. Solar is more expensive than wind right now, but he said that GE expects renewable energy mandates to help drive growth and bring costs down....MORE